Fayvl Tabakman
(1919-1939), (1939-1945), (naturalized c. 1946), was probably born in either the German Empire or the Russian Empire |religion = |birth = |occupation = Cobbler, partisan|spouse = Rivke , Marian (m. 1952) |children = Unnamed son and daughter , unnamed third child (b. 1953)}}Fayvl Tabakman (born c. 1895) was a Polish-born Holocaust survivor who opened a cobbler's shop in Everett, Washington in the years before the outbreak of World War III. Bombs Away, pg. 12, ebook. During World War II, he, his wife Rivke, and their son and daughter were partisans for a time. When they were captured, they were sent to Auschwitz. They were separated, and Tabakman never saw his family again.Ibid., pg. 327. After the Soviets dropped on an atomic bomb on the area between Everett and Seattle,Ibid., pgs. 147-150. Tabakman lost everything again, and moved into Camp Nowhere. There he met up with two Jewish friends and Holocaust survivors Yitzkhak and Moishe.Ibid., pgs. 172-174. He also became close to fellow survivors (and former customers) Marian Staley and her daughter Linda.Ibid., pgs. 231-235. He and Yitzkhak didn't care for camp life but acknowledged the food was better and more plentiful than those in Nazi and Soviet camps. Nor were they being worked to death. Their stories of previous hardships both fascinated and horrified Marian Staley who realized she was just a comfortable American.Ibid. About six weeks after the destruction of Seattle, Tabakman walked Marian and Linda back to the Staley's car/home, and found a teenager, Daniel Philip Jaspers, trying to break in. When he charged at them, Tabakman picked up and rock and threw it, hitting the teenager squarely in the nose, knocking him out. Before Marian went to find a Guardsman, she asked how Tabakman learned to throw like that. He replied with grenades.Ibid., pgs. 234-235. Tabakman and his friends were also puzzled by the growing number of suicides in the camp. With plentiful food and no forced labor, living was soft if boring. Tabakman said he understood someone suffering from radiation sickness wanting to be put out of their pain but not healthy people. He and his friends concluded Americans were soft until Staley object pointing out Hitler and his soldiers hadn't. Tabakman remembered that the U.S. soldiers had shot SS guards and herded nearby German civilians through the camp to show them the horrors. He conceded the point but was still puzzled by the suicides.Ibid., pgs. 324-325. In May, Marian Stanley received word that her husband had been killed during a bombing mission in North Korea. She went into a shocked, dazed state although taking care of Linda helped ground her. Tabakman kept an eye out for her and gave her some comfort from his own tragedy, telling her that time really did help heal such wounds.Ibid., pg. 410.Fallout, loc. 534-593, e-book. In July, he even suggested that he, Marian, and Linda go to a movie. Marian accepted his offer. However, those plans changed when she learned that she was receiving a $15,000 pay out from Bill's life insurance policy, more than enough for her and Linda to leave the camp and start over.Ibid., loc. 1476-1536. Tabakman stayed in the camp. With little else to do, he put his gambling and card skills to work, making money off of his fellow refugees.Ibid., loc. 5145. In November, he received a postcard from Marian Staley. She and Linda had decided to say in Weed, California.Ibid., loc. 3633-3646. By the end of 1951, he'd accumulated enough money to hop a bus and go down to Weed himself. He found an empty commercial space quickly, as the owner wanted it occupied as quickly as possible. By January, 1952, he was open for business. Marian Staley saw his new store and reconnected with him.Ibid., loc. 5133-5157. A few months later, Leroy van Zandt, a driver for National Wood and Timber, died as a consequence of injuries sustained in a truck accident; he was in the back of Doc Toohey's car when he died.Ibid., loc. 6137. Like Staley, Tabakman could see the value in an ambulance for the town. He suggested that all of the local logging companies could chip in for one. After contemplating that idea for a time, Staley brought it to Dale Dropo, who agreed to start running petitions in the paper calling for an ambulance.Ibid., loc. 6150-6199. References Category:Cobblers Category:Guerrillas Category:Holocaust